South Africa: Microsoft making headway against piracy

A Port Elizabeth (PE) businessman is being prosecuted for selling hundreds-of-thousands of rands worth of counterfeit Microsoft software. Packaged to look like the real thing, and featuring simulated holograms and counterfeit certificates of authenticity, the goods were being sold out of Vikesh Singh's PE Technologies shop, in Newton Park, PE. Dale Waterman, Microsoft's corporate attorney for anti-piracy in the Middle East and Africa, accompanied police on the raid. “Evidence uncovered during the raid points to the supply of products manufactured by a global counterfeiting syndicate from the Far East.

However, there is still a long way to go. The problem for Microsoft and other software companies is explained by Microsoft SA anti-piracy manager Charl Everton who said earlier this year “In SA, one in every three copies of our software is used illegally. Estimates suggest that reducing piracy by 10 percentage points over four years could generate an extra 1 200 jobs in the local IT sector, R6 billion in local industry revenue, and R490 million in additional tax revenue.” (Source ITWeb)

Microsoft is an active member of the Business Software Alliance. See also, earlier posts here.